The teenager, from one of the poorest parts of the country - Little Horton in Bradford - had completed his four-month community service and just wanted to get on with his life.

He had managed to turn his life around, achieving top grades and helping out at GPs' surgeries and charities. But Imperial College and Manchester University had rejected him.

Then, after extensive coverage in the Guardian, Manchester University agreed to reconsider Ahmed. In August - two months before term started - the university offered him a place and he packed his bags.

Ahmed is now 20 and has just finished his first year of medical school. He is back in Little Horton for the holidays, having passed all his exams, and is about to start a summer job at his local doctor's surgery.

"People are stopping me in the street to ask how I'm liking medical school and what the university is like," he says. "I tell them that it's definitely a challenge, but that I'm just loving it.

"We've learned how to talk to patients - to ask them open questions and not put words in their mouths. We've been studying blood pressure and listening to the sounds that the heart makes. I can't wait for my third year, when we are based in hospitals."

Ahmed will move into a student flat with friends in October. "The people I have met are great," he says. "There's such a big student population that there is always someone around to socialise with. Everyone is very friendly. Most of my friends, but not all, are medics. Many of the medics come from good backgrounds. It can be a bit intimidating, but I've got over that now. They don't look down on me."

Ahmed says he is conscious of his past in a "good and bad way. I think some people particularly observe me to see that I'm not getting up to anything," he says. "It makes me a bit self-conscious, but they mean well.

"I've learned to be more sociable and approachable, and I'm more independent than a year ago," he says. "Tomorrow I'm going to pop into my old school and say hello."